More unequal, but more mobile?: Earnings inequality and mobility in OECD countries

Andrea Garnero, Alexander Hijzen and Sébastien Martin
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Sébastien Martin: OECD

No 177, OECD Social, Employment and Migration Working Papers from OECD Publishing

Abstract: This paper provides comprehensive cross-country evidence on the relationship between earnings inequality and intra-generational mobility by simulating individual earnings and employment trajectories in the long-term using short panel data for 24 OECD countries. On average across countries, about 25% of earnings inequality in a given year evens out over the life cycle as a result of mobility. Moreover, mobility is not systematically higher in countries with more earnings inequality in general. However, a positive and statistically significant relationship is found only in the bottom of the distribution. This reflects the role of mobility between employment and unemployment and not that of mobility up and down the earnings ladder. Ce document fournit une analyse approfondie de la relation entre l’inégalité des revenus d’activité et la mobilité intra-générationnelle en simulant les trajectoires professionnelles à l’aide de données de panel sur une courte période pour 24 pays de l’OCDE. En moyenne et pour l’ensemble des pays, environ 25% de l'inégalité des revenus observée une année donnée s’égalise au cours du cycle de vie du fait de la mobilité. De plus, la mobilité n’est pas systématiquement plus élevée dans les pays généralement plus inégalitaires en termes de revenus. Toutefois, on observe une relation positive et statistiquement significative entre inégalité et mobilité dans la partie inférieure de la distribution. Cela reflète le rôle de la mobilité entre emploi et chômage, et non celui de la mobilité ascendante et descendante sur l'échelle des salaires.

Keywords: earnings-experience profiles; intra-generational mobility; life-time inequality; simulation (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: E24 J30 J62 O57 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2016-02-26
New Economics Papers: this item is included in nep-eec, nep-lab and nep-mac
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Citations: View citations in EconPapers (6)

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https://doi.org/10.1787/5jm3p5m7ccr2-en (text/html)

Related works:
Journal Article: More unequal, but more mobile? Earnings inequality and mobility in OECD countries (2019)
Working Paper: More Unequal, But More Mobile? Earnings Inequality and Mobility in OECD Countries (2016)
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Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:oec:elsaab:177-en

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